The Pumas started the game like the last few weeks, asleep.

The Brumbies certainly had their tails up quickly racing to a 12-0 lead after only five minutes. This served to wake the Pumas up who managed to level the score over the next few minutes with tries to Doug Blackburn and JJ Noonan.

The Pumas continued to trade tries up to half-time which allowed Brewarrina to take a 22-17 lead going into the break with the comfort of a strong breeze at their backs for the second half.

Disaster struck early in the second half for the Pumas with injuries to Doug Blackburn and Tim Whiteley as well as a concussion to Olly Holland resulting in the Pumas being down to 13 men at one stage.

This period allowed the Brumbies to run riot scoring a further five tries with most coming from the first phase ball and going through their whole team’s hands.

You could have been easily forgiven for thinking that a game of touch football was being played.

It must be said that the Pumas never gave up with some great forward play resulting in some consolation tries to the Pumas including one to British import Tom after a powerful run to the line.

The final score-line read 53-34. Best for the Pumas included Bruce Chamberlain and Tom the Pom in the forwards while Jim O’Rourke and Matt McKay, who was playing his last game for the Black and White, didn’t stop trying all day out in the backs. Another mention goes to Henry Welsh and Eenaweena Stevie who had their best games of the year thus far.

I guess the long and short of it was that the great defensive effort from the previous week against Coonamble deserted the boys on the day with the failure to tie the ball up in the tackle allowing the Brumbies to play their famous ‘sevens’ style of rugby.

A big thanks also to coach Brennan who doubled as the referee for the day and to Barry Stephens who again gave up his Saturday to drive the bus up to Brewarrina.

This weekend sees a general bye for the Western Plains comp which will come at a much needed time for the Pumas to get over some injuries and get some players back before they take on the Cobar Camels at home for the Auscott sponsor’s day on July 4.